Exxon Valdez
On March 24, 1989 at 4 minutes past midnight, the oil tanker ExxonValdez struck a reef in Alaska's breath-taking Prince William Sound. Instantaneously, the quiet waters of the sound became a sea of black. "We've fetched up - ah - hard aground north of Goose Island off Bligh Reef, and - ah - evidently leaking some oil," Joseph Hazelwood, captain of the ship, radioed the Coast Guard Marine Safety Office back in Valdez. That "some oil" turned out to be a total of 11,000,000 gallons of crude oil leaking from the ruptured hull of the ship. By the time a containment effort was put forth, a weather storm had helped to spread the oil as much as three feet thick across 1,400 miles of beaches.
A ...
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with an enormous socio-economic effect that has left many people wondering when and where the next oil spill will be. Many associated with the recovery process, and its more than one hundred projects per year, say it will take longer than a human lifetime to determine if a full recovery is possible (Fine 1999).
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
The oil spill was initially thought of as a two to three year clean-up project. As time went ahead, scientists and clean-up crews realized that it would take a longer period of time and require a lot more effort than originally planned. Up to this point, the oil has contaminated a national forest, four wildlife refuges, three national parks, five state parks, four "critical habitat areas" and a state game sanctuary, which spreads along 1,400 miles of the Alaskan shoreline. Recent scientific studies show that the oil continues to wreak havoc among many spawning salmon, herring, and other species of fish. This is even more devastating when ...
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improvement since the spill occurred. This group includes harbour seals, killer whales, harlequin ducks, common loons, cormorants, and the pigeon gullomot. In some areas, that have been hardest hit by the oil spill, many of the species have an elevated level of mortality. Even though the Exxon Valdez is the most-studied oil spill in world history, it is also a particularly difficult one to research because of the lack of baseline data on the ecology of Prince William Sound (Birkland 1998).
Among all the animal casualties, there is another victim, people. Thousands have been forced to bare the consequences of the Exxon Valdez oil spill. Throughout the years, the waters of Alaska ...
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Exxon Valdez. (2008, January 16). Retrieved November 23, 2024, from http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Exxon-Valdez/77553
"Exxon Valdez." Essayworld.com. Essayworld.com, 16 Jan. 2008. Web. 23 Nov. 2024. <http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Exxon-Valdez/77553>
"Exxon Valdez." Essayworld.com. January 16, 2008. Accessed November 23, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Exxon-Valdez/77553.
"Exxon Valdez." Essayworld.com. January 16, 2008. Accessed November 23, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Exxon-Valdez/77553.
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